The Headliner
by Miharu is Harukas Love Child 2
Summary: "The running joke in this block is that we are just entertainers waiting to give the public the greatest—and final—show of our lives." Mello awaits his execution on death row, unless he can prove he was framed for the most sensational crime of the century. AU, Mello POV. Violence and Yaoi. MxM and some NxM. For Kari Twilight Mist
1. His Hair Was Fire

Chapter 1: His Hair Was Fire

A/N: This is an AU story about Matt and Mello and is written from Mello's POV. Also, no, it's not a typo. His hair wasn't _on fire_, Mello mistakes Matt's hair for actual fire.

* * *

When I met Matt for the first time, it was the summer of my twelfth year. Of course, he wasn't Matt back then. It was around the the same that that Rossy, my collie shepherd mix, passed away in the cruelest way I've ever seen an animal go. I think that was hardest time for me, the time I met Matt and the months that followed. It was an unpleasant time for everyone. We had been doing some house repairs and I tied Rossy to the back fence so he wouldn't get in the way of my dad's tools and stuff. Well when I went to go untie him and take him for a walk, he was gone—rope and everything. He knew his way pretty well around the maple woods that grew behind the house so I thought he might have gone for a run. He should have been back by nightfall.

I wish I had gone looking for him.

That night there was a lightning storm with thunder. If you've ever owned a dog, then you've probably seen their frantic crazed behavior towards loud noises. Fireworks, blow horns, thunder...they get all dogs into jitters. Well that night the thunder came with the lightning storm. I remember seeing the giant flashes of blinding hot light just tear through the sky, like they were searing the earth with blinding forks of white. And then there was a crackle in the distance. I was sitting in the living room watching from the window, and I heard the crack and saw the red flames quickly envelop a whole section of wood. It was brilliant and terrifying all at once and yet...transfixing with a tranquility I still can't describe. The fire spread quickly, eating everything in its path like a hungry sea sea of reds and oranges. Orange and Red washed over everything.

Lightning hit the tree house.

Tree house set on fire.

Everything was colors. Moving and running and spreading and leaping and lapping and licking and sputtering and crackling and crashing and bursting like when water hits a hot oiled pan.

The fire was alive. Except it wasn't fire. It was human.

With his long scrawny arms huddled close around Rossy's body, I watched a boy leap from the fire burial to the ground below. He swore over and over again as they rolled, crashing into branches and leaves and dirt and rocks...rolling and putting the fire out of his clothes, Rossy's hair...The boy was saying something but I couldn't hear it over the horrible high pitched scream that kept ringing in my ears. Crackles of orange and red and the screams. Everything was sounds and moving colors and screams.

The boy's arms waved and I inched out of my trance enough to realized the screams were mine. My legs moved despite my panicked mind; I ran to them. The boy threw his arms around me.

"Are you okay? Speak to me! Should I call an ambulance?" I sputtered out at him.

I remember thinking those first moments I saw him, _oh my God, his hair is fire! His hair is fire! How is it not burning his face?_

The boy looked up at me with the clearest green eyes I'd ever seen and whispered, "An angel came to my rescue."

He pressed his lips to mine and plum passed out across my legs. I tried shaking him but he wouldn't respond with more than a groan. Rossy licked my hand and the boy's head and I yelled at him to keep away from the fire. I would realize later that his hair was red but at the time I was just bewildered that the fire on his head wasn't burning with the same passion as the fire that ate the trees around us.

Somehow I dragged Rossy and the boy into my house.

An ambulance arrived in just under half an hour.

At the hospital, I asked the candy striper at the front desk if she could direct me to that kid. "Excuse me. I want to check on the boy who was burned and came in yesterday."

"Oh, you mean the child who rescued the dog? Yes, there are no visitor's right now, you may go up. Room 34 J on the second floor please."

I found the room easily. I knocked. A nurse was changing his bandages so I waited a minute before stepping through the white curtain that divided his part of the room from where another patient could have been. He smiled at me and I just sat there in the guest chair looking anywhere but at his face.

He spoke, finally, "Thank you."

I didn't know what to say, so I just nodded and turned my eyes to his bedside table. Water. An unopened jell-o snack. And umn...a pink...bedpan...

"You and your dog saved my life."

I looked up at him, meeting his eyes for the first time since he'd passed out the day before. I admit I was afraid. I didn't really know what to expect the kid to look like after rolling around in so much fire and I thought just...what if he was all disfigured and scary lookin' and I stared and hurt his feelings? I didn't think I could take it if it were me. I was scared to look at him and deep down I felt ashamed of my own fears. I tried to keep my eyes on his eyes but it was too hard not to see the whole boy. He had a some cuts across his cheek and the eyebrow on the left side was near singed completely off. His hair was so red I almost thought he was on fire again. The bandages were on mismatched parts of his body.

"Why are you shaking?"

"I'm not." I mumbled lowly.

Shaking? Was I? Embarrassed I stiffened as still as possible.

Again, it was the boy who broke the silence, "Guess I have the perfect mummy costume for Halloween, huh?"

I stiffened more, "M-my mother says Halloween is wicked."

"Ah," came the reply. "Wait...so you've never dressed up before? Or gone trick-or-treating?"

I shook my head.

"You're a strange kid," he went on. "But you saved me. I don't know what would have happened if wasn't for you and your dog. I haven't lived here for very long and I thought camping would be an excellent idea. Guess I should have checked the weather before pitching my tent. That storm caught me by surprise. I thought I was a goner in that storm. Your dog led me to that treehouse where there was shelter."

"That's actually a dangerous place in a lightnining storm."

"Tch. I know that now, you betcha. Gee." He padded down on the bandaged parts and winced, "So, what's your name, my little guardian angel?"

"Mello. Yours?"

"Matt." He smiled, "Do you want to see the burned area?"

I nodded. I wasn't scared so much anymore.

Matt undid the bandages. They weren't terrible burns but there would be some bad scarring across his stomach, back, and part of his chest. Bits of the leg too.

"Oh you don't have to take your pants off, it's okay." I covered my eyes to give him some privacy anyways.

His toned rose in pitch, "What are you so embarrassed about? It's just skin, like you have too. Ah, forget it. Girls are so weird about stuff like that."

Girls?

I stood up and puffed my chest out, "I'm a boy, you know."

At first the he just smiled blankly. Then the corners of his lips dipped slowly down as he furrowed his brow in realization.

That was his cue to be embarrassed.

"What? Oh man, gross!"

That wasn't the reaction I had expected from him.

"I'm gross?" I demanded, a little bewildered.

"Ugh, eww." He spit into the bedpan, "You should have told me that before I kissed you. Gee wiz."

I felt my ears burn as I remembered. I was so panicky at the time that it hadn't even registered what had happened, but now with a moment to reflect...well...

We didn't talk much after that but I ended up staying until the end of visiting hours anyways.

I couldn't explain it but it just seemed so natural the way we sat there, wordless for the most part. I buried my nose against my jacket and let the citrus-y aroma of an orange from my pocket overwhelm me. I was hyper conscious of his fingers as they trailed little circles across the bandages on his leg. It was safe. There was nothing here. No mom to yell at me, no Dale with his beer bottles and the sharp glass pieces he liked to shove up—

_BOOM!_

"Yaaaah!" I flinched, slipping off my chair painfully to the floor—right on my butt.

I looked up to see Matt with an exploded balloon across his lap.

I could feel the deep blush creep across my cheeks as his laughter filled the air, "Oh my God, you're hilarious."

I stuck my tongue out at him, "I'm glad you find me so amusing."

"You are amusing. You are fun. You are anything I want you to be." He opened his arms wide towards me like Jesus does in those paintings where he gathers all the little children to him.

I hesitated before allowing him to help me up, "So I cannot be any of those things without you, then?"

Instead of answering, he pulled me into a bear hug. We let our foreheads bump. He was so close it almost hurt to look at him.

I didn't know it then, that I would grow to crave that very touch. I didn't know that the boy in front of me would open my eyes to the world around me and teach me how to see into the depths of my own soul. I didn't know I would betray him and blacken my existence forever. Maybe I would have run right then and there, if only I _had_ known...

If only I had known...

...maybe he wouldn't have had to die.

Maybe...I wouldn't be stuck in this hell hole prison, waiting to join him.

Maybe.

* * *

Romero is the guard in charge of my block. He's a tall burly man of nearly six feet and I've grown fond of him these past thirty-seven years. He's a man who doesn't overexert his power on the inmates. He doesn't cause or look for trouble. He's like the walls that see and hear but don't whisper secrets. I was surprised to see him come to my cell. We've never exchanged many words. I stared as he unlocked the gate to my iron castle.

"Mello."

"Romero."

I cocked my head to the right but didn't rise from my bunk.

"You have a visitor."

I raised my eyebrow at the guard, "One of my _fans_ come to see me off before I expire?"

Everyone here is somewhat of a celebrity. Our faces were once plastered across newspapers. Oh, I remember those days when they took me to trial. The lights and the cameras and all the protesters screaming for my head to be put on a platter. I stepped into the hall like a king. Nobody cared what the story was. Nobody cared if I was innocent, they just wanted a piece of me...the judge looked like a Grammy host all dressed up in black and ready to give me the award for most wanted criminal. I took my bow atop that stage many, many years ago. Locking us up here doesn't stop the groupies. They write letters. They come. Hell, there's a girl here trying to marry Charlie Manson. The running joke in this block is that we are just entertainers waiting to give the public and the media the greatest—and final—show of our lives.

"Fans? Something like that, they sent their greeting card ahead. Mean anything to you?"

I took the offered card in hand and turned it twixt my fingertips. It was a tarot card, the death. On the other side was a highly stylized letter. A single solitary letter L. I looked up at Romero, crumpling the card into a ball.

"It did mean something...in another life."

I stood up and followed him out into the hall. We found ourselves in front of a room I recognized for interrogation. Not the usual visitor, I presumed. I walked in, but Romero didn't follow. He closed the door and I could hear the click of the lock turn from the outside. The room wasn't much to look at—just a table and a couple of chairs...they were all chained to the floor so they couldn't be used as weapons. A woman sat to one side and a man stood beside her. They were both lacking composure but you could tell the woman was trying harder to hide it by sitting straighter and concentrating on looking demure.

"You're not the the court appointed lawyer," I said smoothly, not bothering to take a seat.

"No, Mr. Mello. I'm not a lawyer. I'm a journalist."

Ah, there it was. Someone else just wanting a piece of me.

"Sorry, I'm not giving you the right to my autobiography."

I turned away, intent on leaving. I knew the type, and I didn't want to deal with her.

"Wait, I'm sure you know that I'm with Wammy's. I know you recognize that card."

I stopped and tilted a bit, "You could have gotten that card anywhere. Giving it to me don't mean shit. Get the hell out of here."

She stood up, dropping her chair to the floor with a clang, "L sent me!"

At this I laughed. This kid was really pushing the grift.

"L sent you?" I mocked her, "Tell me, how does a dead man give orders?"

"I've been sent by L's successor," she acquiesced.

His successor. I could feel my blood boiling. His _successor _my ass! That two-timing albino weasel was nothing compared to L. I bet L was turning in his grave over the idea that his legacy fell to that little piss swine. Every time I close my eyes I see those white pajamas and that slim little neck...and what I wouldn't give to snap it in two! What the fuck would that dipshit send someone to see me for? I got up and kicked the door as hard as I could.

"We're done. Guard! Guard!"

"No, no, no, no, no, no! Wait, Mr. Mello, please. Please, I'm here to help you."

"I don't need help from Near," I spat and turned towards the door again, "Romero, let me out of here."

A gruff voice spoke, the man's, "Nobody's coming for you. We came from Wammy's, you know how this works."

Yeah. Yeah I knew how it worked, alright. Wammy's is well...there wasn't much point in arguing. The question was...were the two in the room my enemies or just innocent pawns sent by the enemy?

I took the empty seat and stuck my middle finger at the woman, "Okay. I'm listening. What did that motherfucking bleached-ass cunt-sucker send you here for?"

See? I can be civil. Nobody can accuse me of being uncivil.

The woman didn't answer. She simply stared at me. So I stared back. She was neither pretty nor ugly, the kind of girl you wouldn't notice in a crowd. The man was similarly unassuming.

And for all the hoopla, they said nothing.

Nothing at all.

"Is there something on my face that you keep staring?" I finally asked.

She blushed a little, "You are as beautiful as my grandmother described you to be."

"Your grandmother? The fuck, kid? Who the hell are you?"

"Yes, how rude of me, I forgot to introduce myself. My professional name is Lidner. The silent one is my partner, Track."

I didn't take her extended hand. Instead I set my shoes on the table. Lidner? Well fuck. Those amber eyes did look annoyingly familiar.

"My grandmother kept a diary that I inherited when she passed. It contained a lot of information about you, Mr. Mello. A lot of information, indeed."

"Now that's interesting. The granddaughter of Halle Lidner, you say? And you know all about me from her diary?"

"Yes, Mr. Mello."

"You say you know all about me. Then you should also know I'm the reason she's dead. I killed Halle Lidner."

"I don't believe you killed anyone."

"Go home, little girl. You don't know what you're digging into. Play historian with someone interested."

"You shouldn't be so hasty to shut people out, Mr. Mello. Do you suppose I might tempt your cooperation with this?"

Track handed a box to Lidner Jr. and she opened it. From the box she pulled out a pair of half-melted and cracked goggles.

A familiar pair of orange tinted goggles.

_Matt...oh Matt._

_I'm so sorry._

* * *

_To be continued..._

A/N: Thanks for reading. Please review and subscribe :)


	2. L and Kira

Chapter 2: L and Kira

A/N: I've had a rough few months dealing with sick relatives and my dad getting laid off of work. So I'm sorry I didn't get this out sooner. Life , ya dig? Anyhow thank you for your interest in this story. Special thanks to UsernameUnderConstruction, XyXz, and ShinigamiMailJeevas for reviewing. Your encouragement is felt very deeply.

Chapter 1 recap: Mello reminisces his first meetings with Matt. He seems to regret his involvement with Matt which may have included love, betrayal, and the redhead's untimely death. We learn that Mello has been on death row for 37 years. Two Wammy's agents pay him a visit just days before his scheduled execution, and to Mello's surprise they have Matt's goggles.

Disclaimer: I'm not a doctor. I made up all of this medical shit. And I totally remade the idea of Kira and the Kira Case for this fanfiction. Super not canon, yo.

* * *

Matt's goggles are something of a novelty item. They're tinted for driving in the harsh sunlight, although he had the bad habit of losing things so he opted for goggles instead of glasses. If they were around his neck they wouldn't get misplaced...or something like that. I was never really sure. I just liked ripping them off his face and chucking them across the room. That first piercing look of annoyance as his eyes dilated in the direct light...I loved it. And as long as he wore those goggles, his eyes were a delicacy only I could enjoy. The goggles that Lidner Jr. had given me were undoubtedly Matt's...in fact, they were my final memento of him. It had been a long time since I'd held them in my hands….and the last time I'd seen them, they were in Near's. Near is the one person I hate in this world almost as much as I hate myself. No, fuck that, I hate him the most. End of story.

There aren't words to describe how deeply I loath the entity that is Near River. Once upon a time I thought he was friend...but he's nothing more than a conniving backstabbing little bitch and I'd love nothing more than to see him dead. The truth is...Near _should_ have died. I blew up a fucking building that he was supposed to be in, and he should have died. He should have died! It was a beautiful plan, bordering on goddamn artwork! Sheep plus fire equals barbecue. Simple. Beautiful. Flawless.

Except nothing went as planned.

I don't know how the chain of events went but he must have known my plan. Near and I are like two sides of a coin and he knows how to get into my head really well. Hell it wasn't the first time I'd tried to kill him, so I'm not surprised he found out...not that any of that really matters anymore. The important thing is that Near wasn't in the building—_Matt was_. Somehow the fucker switched places and I killed Matt in his place and that—_that_—I will never forgive him for.

And I remember what Near said to me, what he said when I saw him last. It was the day of my trial. The bailiff had just slapped the prison-issue designer bracelets around my wrists and I stood proudly with Matt's goggles in my hands. A few Wammy's agents were sitting in the amphitheater and Near was among them, curling a lock of his white hair. He made his move when it was time for me to leave the hall. He whispered it into my ears as he pulled the goggles out of my hands—pried his damn trophy out of my hands.

_Unless you win the game or solve the puzzle, you're nothing but a loser_

Nothing. But. A. _Loser_.

It took five guards to pry me off that worthless albino shit. I felt bones crunch beneath my fists as I pounded into his legs and sunk my teeth into an arm. And I painted that white canvass in shades of blood. Blood that dripped from my fists. Blood that ran from the gashes on his body. Blood that welted in bruises and stained reds and purples and greens across that milky skin. And they carted me away in my handcuff before I could finish strangling him with the metal chain.

I was left with nothing.

And Near had everything.

"Mr. Mello, the car will be around in 12 minutes. Please change into these clothes in the meantime."

Lidner Jr. Handed me a bag, presumably the change of clothes. I began to strip in the room. She blushed and averted her eyes.

"Oh come on,kid. Nobody in this place has any sense of shame with their bodies. We don't even have the dignity of being able to flush our own waste down the toilet."

"R-right. Sorry, please continue."

I'm not sure if the woman was feigning prudence or whatever. I've never felt vulnerable naked. I slipped into the t-shirt and jeans and allowed Lidner to blindfold me. There was nothing to be afraid of. The worst they could do was kill me, and I've prepared myself for death from the moment I stepped foot on death row. At the very least, I was knew where they were taking me. I was going to where Near was.

Near. Or I suppose he was L now to the justice-loving world. Some fucked up sense of Justice!

Justice is merely an illusion. Governments and countries are nothing more than factions of the greatest organized crime syndicate in the world. All the wars and epidemics are planned and executed by a single organization: Wammy's. Wammy's is an organization that grooms genius children into the future masterminds and saviors of the world. The truly outstanding ones are called the Alphabets: an elite group of individuals that outclass the simple name of genius. They are the ones who change the world. It is the desire of every Wammy's agent to gain their own letter and join rank with the Alphabets, but sometimes for the sake of world order, continuity isa goal. No two people alive can share the same letter. In this way, a letter must be earned and passed on through a successor. This is the primary reason that Wammy's gathers children in orphanages around the world: there is a need to select only the best who can carry the torch for their predecessors. Their methods are less than savory. If you defy them, you die. If you follow them spinelessly, you suffer a fate much worse. They plant their agents in every country. Sometimes there are renegades and deviants...do gooders who think they can change the world with unrealistic ideals...people like Martin Luther King or Mahatma Gandhi. Sometimes there are a few of the opposite. A few years ago a young man named Light Yagami tried to infiltrate and an agent named Lawliet died as a result. Lawliet was different, though. Lawliet didn't play by the rules of Wammy's. Lawliet didn't believe in kidnapping children and raising them into the Wammy's army. He didn't believe in betraying the trust of the other Wammy's agents. Lawliet was my hero. He was also the last one to bare the alias L. I was once a candidate to be his successor. In the days of my youth, I was preparing myself to be the next L.

But he's been dead a long time, and in his place now sits a man I hate. A man I used to trust.

Near.

I clenched my fist as I was being led around blindfolded. Near. _If _I was lucky enough to see him in person I'd jam my fingernails into his pretty little white throat. He isn't stupid enough to do anything more than hide behind a computer monitor, but perhaps I could make use of Track and Lidner Jr. They might be Wammy's but that doesn't mean they can outsmart me. Of course Near would have thought of that ahead of time. The most likely scenario is that they know too little to be of any real use to me. I wouldn't be able to get them to take me to his physical location. I'd have to settle for being dragged into some warehouse where at best I'd speak to a monogrammed L on a computer screen or at worst I'd be talking to some proxy L who acted as his physical face. No, Near wasn't Lawliet. He had his own way of doing things. But if I know him the way I think I do...then I probably will get to see him face to face. I will have exactly one chance. That is the way between Near and I. We are both risk takers and enjoy the pressure when all the cards are on the table and the one with the best plan, the most thorough logic, usurps the other in complete and perfect victory.

A bag was placed over my head, presumably to limit my ability to hear the sounds around me and deduce the location. I was led to a car, presumably unmarked. From the weight of the body who slid next to me, I assumed that Track was driving and Lidner was to my left. Two car doors shut in unison and the hum of the wheels as they tread pavement was the only sound to accompany my great excursion out of jail.

Until some gimmicky ringtone broke the peace. The girl answered.

"This is K."

Hmmnn...K? She was one of the Alphabets? It wasn't entirely impossible. Lidner's granddaughter didn't strike me as impressive, but perhaps her specialty lay elsewhere. Unless she was acting under a name like Kay. The Alphabets are considered to be the best of the best at their trade. Some were artists. Others were thieves. Assassins, writers, hackers, con artists, detectives...all manner of professions were associated with the Alphabets.

"Understood. I will remove Mr. Mello's blindfold."

She took the cloth away from my eyes and I squinted until they adjusted to the lighting. I looked over at Lidner who had a small tablet. The screen was projecting a small scripted w. Lidner tapped a few spots on the tablet and a scrambled voice began to speak to me.

"Mello."

"Yes?"

"You have an appearance to make in court today regarding the dismissal of your involvement with the Kira Case. You will be meeting with L shortly to be prepped for the meeting."

_Dismissal of involvement from the Kira Case?_ I nearly felt my heart stop. I snatched the tablet from Lidner and screamed at it.

"What the fuck is going on here? I demand an explanation."

"I have not been given clearance to provide Mello with additional information. All will be explained at headquarters. I will meet with you at the rendezvous point."

When the scripted w disappeared a moment later I rounded on the agents in the car.

"Tell me what the fuck is going on here! You come to me with under the premise that you have information regarding Matt and you kidnap me out of jail. Am I to understand you want me acquitted from the case that has kept me behind bars for the last 37 years?! I'm supposed to be executed in a few days for that very case. What the fucking hell is going on?!"

"Alright. I suppose it's okay to tell you a few more details regarding the Kira Case. As you are aware, we are actually trying to get you acquitted of all involvement with the case..."

"Bullshit. Near provided the evidence to convict me. I confessed to it. That was the agreement we had."

"The evidence Near presented has been compromised. L's being blackmailed with the other holo files. And what's more, it appears that Pandora is alive. Pandora is alive and it has evolved."

"Impossible. Matt, Near, and I created Pandora. We're the only ones capable of changing it or shutting it down, and even doing that much requires two of us."

"Precisely."

Oh my god. Oh my God.

The cruel truth about Wammy's is that sometimes in the process of setting up a hero, a villain must also be born. That's what Pandora was created for. Project Pandora was a computer virus that targeted a database called FN-19. FN-19 was the master database of a tuberculosis vaccine administered to children under the age of 2. That particular vaccine, which was distributed worldwide, had a latent virus that attacked the central nervous system of whoever was infected by it. The virus was called out of dormancy by a specific artificial protein rbOz that Wammy's also developed. When the Pandora virus was activated, it targeted the injection of the rbOz protein into all the major food processing plants worldwide. Effectually, anyone who'd ever gotten a TB shot and who didn't grow their own organic food from scratch would have the FN-19 virus activated into their system. Third world, first world...there was no discrimination. FN-19 had a 98% death rate.

Wammy's had the damn fucking market on bio-terrorism.

And Matt, Near, and I...we were the goddamn keys to the mechanism.

The idea was that this system, the Pandora Virus, was essentially developed by Matt by tweaked by Near and I. As a Wammy's agent, Matt specialized in technology; however, he wasn't in the running to replace Lawliet as L and therefore had neutrality in the rivalry between Near and I. Since Lawliet died without naming his heir apparent, Near and I played a game to determine who was the most worthy of becoming the new L: the world greatest detective. Wammy's set the both of us to work with Matt who integrated our DNA into the access mechanism for Pandora. Retinal scans, fingerprinting, blood and hair samples, as well as voice recognition systems all prevented the access of Pandora's main system. It required any combination of the three of us to access. Even as the creator, Matt couldn't hack his own system without either Near or I physically with him. Our game began when we set the system off on a timer and spread rumors across the internet of an apocalyptic virus that would kill. To make governments take notice, we began mailing warnings to media outlets and new stations predicting the deaths of convicted criminals. Criminals that were given the death penalty began dying in droves, following the predictions we sent out. In truth, they were being fed food infected with the rbOz protein. Those who had the FN-19 virus from their childhood vaccines would become paralyzed due to failure of the central nervous system. Without the flow of oxygen to the heart muscle, the victims would suffer heart attacks and die. The rumors spread like wildfire. The media bolstered the hype around the so called Heart Attack Killer, or Kira, as was popularized by Japanese bloggers. Within a short amount of time it became apparent that whoever this Kira person was, they were behind the heart attacks and thus were committing mass scale murder. Regardless of the moral implicated of killing convicted criminals, there was no way of knowing what Kira was capable of or how he was committing the murders.

Thus the world turned to L.

Who of course...was already dead.

The game was simple. It was a contest between Near and I. Whoever could frame the other for being Kira and successfully present the evidence before the world would take over the title of L. The other would be convicted as Kira and rot in jail for the crime. Naturally we agreed. Matt created fake evidence in the form of something he called a holo disc. There were three holo discs. Matt gave one to me, one to Near, and one to Watari. The discs Near and I held were the exact evidence to convict ourselves for the crime of being Kira. The third disc was a backup of both mine and Near's discs to be used against us in the event that we destroyed ours. Another set of holo files also set in place so that if Matt cheated and helped one of us have an advantage over the other, the three of us would be infected with the virus and die. We played the game. Near won. However he beat me, whatever means that cheat used, I lost my life, my career, and my best friend. I was so caught up in the game that I completely lost sight of what was most important to me.

...and this bitch Lidner Jr wants to tell me that Near is gonna wipe the last forty-fucking years off my record? Bull-fucking shit! When everything was said and done, Near and I shut the Pandora Project down. It's dead. Done. Gone.

Just like Matt.

"We are approaching our destination. I'm afraid I have to replace your blindfold, Mr. Mello."

* * *

The blindfold wasn't removed again until I was inside a building. The shock factor of the light hitting my eyes was overshadowed by Near who was the first thing I saw when I opened my eyes.

"Mello."

There he was, curled up on a mat in his jeans and white shirt. I met his eyes for just a moment, they were the same dark and inhuman blankness that I remembered. Time had worsened his vision for he wore an oversize pair of glasses. A set of crutches at his side told me that the injuries I'd inflicted on him the last time we'd met had at least done permanent damage. Near wasn't going anywhere in that condition. I however, was.

I lunged at him.

The second my fingers grazed his skin I could feel the strangest tingling overtaking my body and rather than strangling the fucker like I'd planned I found my body falling to the ground inexplicably. It took only seconds for a complete numbing to wash over me and I flopped around like a magickarp: useless and powerless.

"Mello's clothes were soaked in a special topical neurotoxin. Mello will not have mobility for thirty minutes."

Damn him! Damn that Near to hell!

"The timing for the release into the bloodstream was off by a margin of approximately 90 seconds. Kay, I do believe he would have killed me if you had been any later in getting him to put these clothes on."

Fucking Near! I'd never even thought he'd pull some crap like this. I couldn't turn my head to see her, but Lidner Jr.'s voice chimed in from somewhere behind me.

"I...that is...please accept my apologies, L."

He didn't even look at her in response. His attention was on me and his eyes danced in mirth at the helpless position he's put me in.

"My dear Mello."

I managed to spit at him. My body wasn't doing what I was telling it to.

"Mello. I will cut straight to the chase. I think there's a chance that Matt is alive."

My brain stopped.

* * *

My mouth wasn't completely numbed anymore but I couldn't make any intelligent speech. I could only listen as Near spoke. I didn't completely catch what he was saying. I was still mulling over the possibility that Matt could actually be alive. I desperately wanted to believe that it was true. And Near had no real reason to lie to me. I caught bits and pieces of his logic for why he thought Matt was alive and I came to the conclusion that I had nothing to lose in believing that he was alive. If he was, it was the biggest relief of my life. I listened as Near went on and explained some recent events at Wammy's. During the yearly hacker proficiency exam an agent in training called Sterling had wormed her way into a highly secure folder that had information on the Pandora Project. Not knowing anything about the files she was in, she tripped one of Matt's old security systems and it triggered an entire hell's worth of viruses and worms to infect the entire network of Wammy's computers. Wammy's or not, the kids taking the exam were amateur hackers compared to Matt and they couldn't withstand his ghost attack. In the few hours it took Near and a few of the alphabets to get everything back to stability, the system was extremely vulnerable. That's when the leak was discovered. The files that Sterling uncovered were changing. The source code was changing. The document types were changing. The purpose and functions of the files were changing. Somehow someone had gotten into the system completely undetected and they were remotely manipulating them: Wammy's was being hacked. When Near tried to track the origin of the attacks he was warned that the holo files were being activated which was the file-type that would infect him, Matt, and I with the virus. Near needed to find the attacker and shut his shit down. He couldn't do it without accessing the Pandora database. And he couldn't do that alone either.

"So Mello, if you help me, we have a chance at finding Matt and being cleared of your involvement in the Kira Case, thus you would be able to start your life over again. If you don't help me, we both die as an effect of the holo files. I'm sure you wouldn't have a problem with that option, except if Matt _is _alive, he dies as well. I don't believe you'd be willing to take that risk. At the end of the day, the choice is yours. What shall it be?"

It was nearing the half hour mark and I was able to speak again.

"Let's make this very clear, Near. I'm not working _with_ you. I'm _using_ you. You are my pawn...a mere tool to help me find Matt. And if I find you are lying, I will kill you. This time I will not fail. That is a promise."

"Of course Mello. I wouldn't have it any other way."

* * *

A/N: This chapter is like information overload. I tried to make it interesting without getting too technical, but I'm not sure if I hit the right balance. If there were parts that were too unclear, please don't hesitate to tell me so I can fix it.


	3. Valkyrie Rising

The Headliner Chapter 3: Valkyrie Rising

A/N: First of all, thank you to all my reviewers. Your comments and suggestions mean a lot to me. Secondly, special props to Defeat Cigarettes. She was kind enough to beta all the pre-lemon bits of the chapter.

Chapter 2 Recap: Mello, Near, and Matt were part of a terrorism plot called the Pandora Project. Near and Mello had played a game to frame each other for it, and Mello lost. During that time, Mello thought Matt had died as result of some trick that Near used. Near ed that Matt is probably alive, and the Pandora project has come back to haunt them. He asks Mello if they can work together to find Matt. Mello temporarily agreed not to cunt punt Near as they search for him.

* * *

Matt officially joined rank with the Alphabets at sixteen. He left the Wammy's House training institute shortly after his promotion and disappeared into obscurity for a while. It's not like he wasn't track-able; Wammy's House keeps tabs on all the Alphabets, and the Alphabets have their own methods of contacting each other for collaboration and shit like that. When Matt left, I wasn't nearly done with my own training and it honestly wasn't my business where he went or what he did, but it would have been nice if he'd at least kept in touch. C'mon, you don't just disappear from out of your best friend's life without a word. I suppose I held a _bit_ of a grudge about the silence, but Matt had his own shit to do and his own missions to carry out. Friendship didn't have a place in that world, and he'd moved ahead of me to a place that was out of reach for mere apprentices. I knew that If I wanted to see him, I'd have to step my game up and take my own letter.

See, Matt belonged to a very elite group, even among the Alphabets. He was what we at Wammy's referred to as a 'Legacy Letter' because he'd inherited his letter from a relative. The Legacies hold a distinction from the rest of the Alphabets: their letters are lower-case and they're almost always groomed from childhood to succeed a blood relation. At sixteen, Matt had succeeded his grandfather as _m_: the world's greatest technology expert and the most formidable hacker ever born. Stepping into heavy boots, m was already infamous in the underground world, but Matt wasn't just continuing his predecessor's work. When he was focused, Matt invented some seriously cool shit, mostly real life versions of gadgets he'd geeked out over from comic books like Batman. However, the things that the redhead was capable of when he was utterly bored, were fucking terrifying.

But also...sometimes just _utterly stupid_.

It was terribly good fun for me, that day in November in Istanbul when we was nineteen, the time I did my first honey trap solo mission. My target was another Alphabet, specifically Matt. I wasn't sitting around doing shit while he was off helping the world burn. I was working hard in my own way. It was part of my espionage training, and I was being mentored under the greatest spy of them all: the Valkyrie. Valkyrie's position is similar to that of Watari's as both of them work directly for L, with the exception that Valkyrie is not a retainer for L, works for other Alphabets, and is invariably a woman. Additionally, Watari is recognized worldwide as a direct contact to L. Valkyrie is more like a chameleon, able to slip in anywhere and obtain any information. In her off time, she worked as a teacher at Wammy's, and her classes were considered basic survival training for most agents. I was her favorite, though. I wasn't even originally in the running to be L's successor during my days at Wammy's House. V wanted me to take over for her. Not gonna lie, it was fucking surreal to be asked to be her protege.

"But I'm a _guy_." I had protested, not quite sure I had heard her correctly, "Why would you consider me for _Valkyrie_?"

"Exactly. Mello, listen carefully. In all the years I've been here, I've never met someone who can do the things _you_ do. I have my pride as Valkyrie, that I am one of the best Valkyries to ever have been. But you, you my little chickadee, can surpass me. My niece Wedy is a brilliant girl, but she doesn't have the same allure that you do."

"But why would I be considered for the position of V? I could understand if you wanted me to be Watari. He's basically the male counterpart to what you do."

"Chickadee, have you _seen_ yourself in a mirror?" The woman shook me hard. "You were born with such natural androgyny that borders on criminal. With a little makeup, you'd be a very striking woman. You have no idea how invaluable it is in this business, to be able to change your gender appearance so easily."

That was the day that I received my first crash course on Jimmy Choo, Louboutin, Prada, and Chanel. Day after day I was trained in the world of being a woman: stepping in heels, wearing makeup, adjusting wigs, fashion and fragrance, waxing my body clean of every bit of hair that wasn't on the crown of my head. I mastered a mess of ridiculous beauty regimens and in the months that followed I came to love them wholeheartedly. I studied body language and flirting techniques in addition to the psychology of sex. My body became a fine-tuned instrument of seduction. I knew the etiquette of high society but could just as easily blend into lower classes, thus I had no finite range of targets. Valkyrie had me fitted with special silicone over skins to create different sizes of breasts, pad my hips, and conceal my junk. I could even get away with bikinis and lingerie without tripping red flags about my real gender. In time she taught me many, many tricks and of course, she was absolutely right on the money with her instinct. It took about two years of grooming before I could begin my work, but even in that first mission, there was no doubt that I was already a capable and dangerous spy.

The day she set me out on my first solo mission, she handed me a handful of files with information about several Wammy's agents. I had one job: within six weeks, I had to steal the item of interest listed under each agent's profile. There were four of them, but what piqued my interest the most was the file of one alphabet in particular who I'd known for years. Matt was in the list. I decided he would be my first target.

"Mello, use that brain of yours. Valkyrie is supposed to be the world's best honey trap," she gave me one last pep talk before I boarded the plane. "Normally the position is held by a woman, but there are things a man can do that a mere woman cannot do. Only a man knows what a man wants. If it's you, you can do _anything_."

Since we'd met as teens, Matt had always been such a flirt, and totally easy to fluster. I'd prepared ahead of time a very distracting costume, just to suit what I already knew was his taste in women. I was intercepting him at the airport in Istanbul during a two-hour layover during which we were supposed to do business before boarding a plane together to finish the transaction in Poland. The idea was to go in, make the exchange, and get the hell out of there before he could realize that I wasn't the mole he'd been contacting from the Russian intelligence agency. I had a long, hip-grazing wig arranged around my chest, hiding my lack of cleavage (even though the silicone-stuffed bra helped in that area a lot). My skirt suit was tailored to just set off the length and curves of my legs: my favorite mode of distraction was the subtle, not-quite panty flash while crossing them. I'd only packed the most basic of accessories: A stun-gun tube of lipstick, and custom Tiffany earrings that doubled as lock-picks. My identifying marker was a man's purple bowler hat embroidered with a yellow rose.

"Anka Vasiliev, I presume?"

I turned to see him from my table near a small cafe in the airport. His hair was still that fiery shock of red that had confused me so many years prior, but he'd cut it much shorter. It didn't fall into his eyes anymore like some overgrown mop. It merely grazed the edges of his eyebrows and he'd sheared most of the sideburns away. The back was neatly tamed above the nape, accentuating the single mole that dotted the otherwise flawless expanse of skin. I expected it, I had...but he really had grown into his ears and his long lean limbs didn't seem so awkward with his heightened stature. The little geeky teen I'd seen only a few years before, was simply not there anymore. There was a heaviness in his step and smirk on his face that was all business and lacked all hints of the cheerful laziness I'd remembered; he had a puffy cream-colored vest over a long-sleeve striped shirt and long leather gloves reached his elbows. Per usual, he'd hid his eyes behind those orange goggles of his. I didn't know what to think. I just tried not to stare.

I nodded to the name he'd called me and tried not to seem too interested in his appearance, making mental notes about how his scarring seemed nearly invisible. I extended my hand to him, "Just Anka will do, mister...?"

He grinned as he took it and sat, "Mr. J."

_He could seriously be an idiot sometimes, _I swear I wanted to slap him_. _Matt hadn't even made a good stab at concealing himself. I already knew his last name was Jeevas.

The real Anka Vasiliev (although that was assuredly a pseudonym) was still delayed in Russia by my hired muscle man. It wasn't that hard to make the trip and pretend to be her, to go through the deal with _m _and get the microform instead of her. I had gone through great lengths to hack her email correspondence and learn everything that Matt knew about her. And while it would have been easier to just steal the microform off of her, there was no point to any of it if I didn't hoodwink Matt. Plus it was easier to simply impersonate someone he was supposed to meet with than to seduce him as a total stranger. Although that second option might have proved a bit more fun. It took about 20 minutes to do the talk work and make the exchange. A hundred and forty million U.S. dollars for two microfilm and one microfiche and we lingered just a few minutes more because Matt was obviously inexperienced at this sort of thing and I needed to get away before he suggested a hotel room.

I sighed a few times, trying to make him feel like he was boring me.

"So you're really the FSB mole?" He changed the subject rather stupidly.

"You question that now?" I threw my fake badge at him, a very near copy to the real woman's fake ID. "You could have asked for this at the beginning. Why _after_ the transaction?"

"No, I just was expecting you to be...a bit more...heavy set."

He was practically drooling over my thighs, and I could see him doing mental calculations, trying to figure out my waist-hip-bust ratio.

I cut into his thoughts, which were taking a decidedly sexual turn...not that I minded, but I had a complete wardrobe change to accomplish before I caught the next flight, "If you'll excuse me, I have need of the washroom."

I flipped my hair over my shoulder and lowered my face slightly so I could look up at him through hooded eyes. I flashed my award-winning smile.

"Of course. I'll be right here." he winked at me. I could have kicked him.

I grabbed my Birkin and stood.

I had to round a corner to the wash room and by the time I locked myself in a stall, I was shaking. I'd never imagined that my reunion with Matt would be so...so...

_Fucking dissapointing!_

It was too easy, the way he let me just have everything. I had gotten what I'd come for and gotten away trouble free. He hadn't given me the fight worth of an Alaphebet. I wished he had put up more of a fight. I stripped in the stall, unbuckling my belt and nearly ripping off the skirt suit I'd been wearing. The brow wig was discarded and I had to cap my blond hair again in nylon for the lace front substitute I'd brought with me. After donning the new pantyhose, a summer dress, short black wig, brown contact lenses, some ballet flats (in case I had to run) and ditching the old costume and purse, I pulled out a smaller carry on and carefully placed the microforms and microfiche in a hidden compartment. I redid my makeup, much heavier, creating a completely different face from before and adding a beauty mark for good measure. Eyebrows are magical and I applied new ones hair by hair with surgical glue and and tweezers. Fake eyelashes went on next. I slipped some extra padding into my bra and shook the dress a bit. It was better to look a bit frumpy and tired. I looked at myself in the mirror. I was unrecognizable. I mussed the bangs a bit, just enough to look like a hot mess.

I stepped out of the washroom and made my way to a different part of the airport, easily slipping past Matt and keeping my distance until my escape flight was ready. There was nothing to tie me to the woman he'd met as Anka Vasiliev. I was on my way to check in for my next flight when an arm tugged at me forcefully, causing me to slip just a bit onto the balls of my heels, into the touch of the potential assailant.

"I'm sorry Miss, but I do believe your flight is this way."

My eyes widened and I only had to glance sideways to see the tufts of red hair, but it wasn't Matt as I'd seen him an hour before. He was wearing a pilot's uniform and a set of glasses perched the bridge of his nose smartly (replacing the goggles). He winked at me wickedly and inwardly I panicked just slightly as I felt the familiar weight of a gun barrel brush my hip. Tipping the pilot's hat with his (now white) gloved fingers, he escorted me in a different direction. Well fuck me sideways, Matt was full of surprises. His grip was strong.

"Wha-what is going on?" I affected a distinctly Midwestern American accent this time, "Sir you are going to make me late. You must have me confused with someone else."

He leaned in and I shuddered as his breath tickled my inner ear with his whisper, "I can't let you walk away trying to double cross me like that. _Anka_, or whoever you are, play along and I might not kill you."

I laughed inwardly. I'd used counterfeit money, well fucking _duh_ but had he expected the deal to go sour? I pretended to be scared and shook a little, not looking him in the eye all whilst beginning to feel just a teensy bit excited. He'd decided to stop being a lazy fucker at last. I debated making a run for it, but I was damn curious as to what kind of move he'd make.

I was forced onto a plane at gunpoint, and panic set in when I realized that it was a private jet with no pilot. Because fucking hell was _Matt _going to fly it? Matt took my carry on and tossed it behind me before handcuffing me to my seat. He grabbed me by my chin and looked me up and down, and I couldn't help but shudder a bit at the idea that he'd actually grown a pair enough to seem in control of the situation. Looking at him up and down in that uniform, gun in hand, eyes steeled like that...it was kind sexy. I grinned visibly and knew exactly how I wanted the rest of this play out.

"Handcuffs?" I rattled my wrists, "Kinky."

I took the opportunity to confuse the fuck out of him by leaning into the touch of his hand and sliding my tongue across his gloved fingers. The reaction was immediate as his eyes went wild with the contact. I tugged the glove up with my teeth and yanked it off, exposing his hand. He wasn't stunned enough to not move. Or maybe he found it amusing and waited my my next move. I didn't give him time to think before I kissed his hand with butterfly touches and then put my tongue to work on his fingers. I looked up at him and wanted to laugh at the way his jaw slacked open. It was hilarious, because I was doing only the lightest bit of teasing. I lifted my foot and rested it against his crotch. It was twitching beneath the fabric.

"You sure you want to keep me locked like this, _stud_?"

Possibly the sound of my voice broke the trance and he remembered himself for a moment. He inched out of my reach and turned heel. I'm sure he had to force himself to retreat into the cockpit. It was cute, really.

The second I was out of his line of sight, I dipped my head towards my hands and slipped one of my earrings off. It was a bit difficult at the angle and I was fortunate that the roar of the engine masked the click of the cuffs and I picked them with the pressurizing wires of my earrings. I almost hadn't worn them but Valkyrie had insisted they were an invaluable accessory. As soon as I was free I replaced my earring and pretended to be captured as I waited for the right moment to make another move. Matt pretty much left me unattended though so I didn't have much to do but stare around the and memorize the exits and positions of windows, chairs, ect...

See? Matt was _good_ on capturing me. I still don't know how the fuck he found me again in the airport, I had thought my disguise was fool proof. But leaving me alone to set myself free and jump the plane with a parachute? _So stupid of him. _

I don't know how long I waited before I stood up, grabbed an emergency parachute, my carry-on with the merchandise and made ready for my escape. It had been a while, perhaps half an hour if I had to guess. As a childish afterthought, I dug into my bag for a tube of normal lipstick and scrawled across the seat in Ruby Woo: _Next time take me for a real date. _I also scribbled a childish drawing of a dick next to it with a small :p

I didn't need to announce the safety hatch opening. I jumped as soon as it opened and never looked back to see if he'd heard or not. I almost wish I had been there to see his face when he saw his charge was gone. The wind hitting my face was fucking exhilarating as I my body soared free through the air. We'd been heading west, so I judged I would be landing in Bulgaria by the time I hit the ground.

I'd be lying if I said my other missions went off without a hitch, but I managed to get all the items V had requested of me, and I actually had a tiny bit of spare time before I was supposed to report back to her...so I decided to do something reckless and stupid. I didn't dare try to see him again though until I was done making rounds with the other three Alphabets that I'd been made to swipe shit off of...but against all the rules, that was exactly what I did...I appeared before him again. Exactly one month after jumping from the plane, I tracked him down yet again. I found myself in a student flat in the south of France, dressed again in the black wig and the clothes he'd last seen me in. The place was a mess, full of empty cans and take out trash, among a whole network of wires and computers and books. And despite the half dozen ash trays everywhere, there were butts of cigarettes littered everywhere. I cleaned up just a bit and set to work making a little surprise for him before I sat myself at little breakfast nook, in full view of the door.

I smiled when the door opened and a well trained gun clicked and pointed itself square between my eyes.

"You!" he didn't know what to make of it, that was evident, and I knew I was confusing the fuck out of him yet again. That _was_ my specialty after all.

"Calm down." I waved the little microform around between my fingers, "I have your merchandise, after all."

He clicked the door behind him, triggering the trap I'd laid. I dove under the table right as the gun went off and covered my face in a mask as a gas bottle released itself and he hardly had time to cover his mouth before diving for me. But it was fast acting sleep gas and he was down before he could reach me. I dragged him to the bedroom and tied his arms and legs with some rope that I'd brought with me. I stripped off my drag clothes and the makeup and donned my male clothes, although I suppose calling them menswear was pushing the envelope. Hip-hugging leather from head to toe screamed exotic dancer just a _bit_. But it was a part of me now, to put on a show every day with my body and my clothes. I pulled a chair from the kitchen and sat a few feet from him as I laced my boots up and slipped my gloves on. I made sure to throw all the women's clothes and the prosthetic breasts and the wig on the floor in a visible spot. When he woke up he jumped a bit, despite the ties on his arms and legs and I had to fight laughter as I stood up and approached him.

"Oh my God, Mello is that you?" His eyes practically popped in their sockets, "Like what the fuck? What the actual fuck, man?" He tried to move but became aware of the ties.

His eyes moved from me to the floor to the clothes to me again, comprehension dawning his face.

"No fucking way...You're...you were...you did...wha...oh man."

And then he laughed. He laughed like he'd just been punk'd real hard and everything was great fun and I knew I'd made the right decision to see him again.

"Mello."

"Hey Matt." I smiled and walked to him, resting my hand on his chin like he'd done to me when I was captive in the plane. I circled my finger on the rust colored stubble as the full effect of my presence hit him.

"Oh my God, it was really you. Wow. What are you...well no, it's pretty damn obvious what you were after, but fucking hell, this is like...wow. Duude, untie me and let me have a look at you! Shit, man."

I sat down on the bed beside him and pulled the cigarette from his pocket, lighted it and took a long drag before I untied his hands, "When did you pick up smoking?"

Matt eyed my mouth and the way I wasn't subtly twirling my tongue around the cigarette. Basically not much of a difference from when I'd been in drag.

"It's kind of a rite of passage. Dealing with the druggies, they gotta see that I'm on something too. Makes them feel uneasy if I'm not." He shrugged.

I raised my eye and he went off into a story about how he was _kind of a cartel ring leader_ in a few countries. As a _side project_. Like for just when he was _bored_. The way he described it with such a disinterest tone simply took me aback. That was Matt being bored and watching the world burn, not giving a fuck as to the real consequences of his actions. I felt so small next to him at that moment. My little ripple on the world was nothing compared to his. At least for that moment.

He was on his second cigarette when he switched the subject, "So. You got me, good."

"You still have that uniform fetish, I see." I recalled his pilot's costume.

He seemed irritated for a second before he burst into laughter again and allowed his body to fall against the bed, exposing his stomach. It was all I could do not to rip his shirt off right then and there. It was just so wrong. He was teasing me unintentionally. I settled for tickling him.

He grabbed my hand, squeezing it, "What the actual fuck? Oh my God you got me good."

I scooted into the bed a bit further and twisted to look at him better, "Payback for your silence, bitch. Not one phone call, e-mail, nothing! How could you just leave and say nothing to me like th—"

Whatever I was scolding him about I forgot when he suddenly yanked me down on top of him and pulled me into a kiss. And like that, Matt's lips told me all the story I needed to know. There was sadness and trepidation in the way he moved his lips against mine, and it held of hint of _sorry_ but was altogether unapologetic too. He forced his tongue past my teeth, almost saying _take whatever's coming, whether you want it or not, it's your fault for stepping back into my life again. _It was like that for seconds, minutes, with my mouth against his and his hands on my ass pulling me closer into him and I couldn't hold him hard enough and it suddenly seemed like we were wearing just altogether too many articles of clothing. I rolled off of him to unzip my vest and toss my gloves while he worked with his own, but he was faster and pinned me down before I could even reach the ties of my pants.

My back to the bed, Matt crawled on top of me, kicking his boots off as he slid a leg to other side of my hips and knelt like that, looking down at me. He chewed at the corner of his lip for a moment.

"What are you hesitating for, _now_?" I growled, not masking my impatience and turning my fingers to his belt buckle.

"No, I was just thinking...that this feeling hasn't changed."

"What feeling?" I asked. He grabbed my wrists and pulled them from his pants.

"The one where you drive me crazy with just a glance and I just can't help but kiss you," He leaned in and I closed my eyes as his nose brushed against mine and again he touched his lips to mine.

There was no rhyme or reason to it. Just fingers moving and grabbing whatever they pleased. He moved his tongue to my neck and I shuddered with the warm contact. It tickled and massaged all once and I found myself panting when his teeth scraped the skin there. When he pulled away I wanted to punch him for cutting the contact. The goggles went flying, then the striped shirt. I set my hands against his ribs and stroked the skin downwards, wanting to see everything. The scars were there, trailing across his torso, but they'd healed wonderfully. I pulled him down onto me and decided I wanted nothing more than to just suck on his exposed flesh, wherever I could get my mouth on. The more I touched him, the more I had to keep touching him. I was possessed with the desire to just touch him and touch him some more. He made little sounds of contentment when my fingers finally found their way into his boxers and yanked at his pubic hair. It was like I'd turned a switch on and he attacked me in turn. His pants slid down. Mine did too. There was a moment where he just stared at the place between my thighs and he visibly hardened but he made no move to touch me. He looked at me with his gorgeous eyes and I suddenly understood why he had frozen. He wasn't sure if I was gonna let him or not.

"Stop looking at me like we're teenagers on Prom night. I'd already be inside your ass if I wanted it that way."

Matt didn't need to be told twice. My legs squeezed his thighs when he thrust into me raw.

I dug my teeth into the flesh atop my hand, drawing blood. It was to repress the scream welling inside my chest. I threw that same hand over his back and dug my nails in for anchoring as he rolled into me more forcefully and pounded me into the mattress. Every time he slid out it felt like he was dragging all my insides out with him and shoving them back haphazardly with each re-entrance.

"Ah Jeevas, pull the fuck out, damnit." I gasped after a few dozen such pleasure-free thrusts.

"Huh?" Matt blinked at me but I pushed him off, easily.

"Too, slow. I'm getting impatient. Lay down."

I winced from pain but still ripped the ties of my boot straps and told him to lose the rest of his clothes as I wiggled the last bit of my pants down and I stood there completely naked.

"Fuck it. Whatever." I ran my fingers through my hair, "Sit up, and work _with_ me."

Unlike him, I didn't bother with the kisses or the light touches, even if it was damn tempting to touch his chest. I did something even cornier; I grabbed his hands and linked our fingers. I turned my back to him and pushed myself down hard in one go.

"Agh!" I let out a gasp. It was all I could do not to scream. Matt needed to fucking move his hips because he was just not fast enough for the pain to ebb with pleasure.

I bounced myself up best I could and let gravity take me down again on him, hard. It didn't take much for him to catch on and we adjusted a bit more, Matt thrusting upwards with me so I slid up and down on him much faster. The pain wasn't so unbearable at that angle but I couldn't take the friction like that either, it just wasn't enough. I needed more. I _needed_ more. We rolled sideways on the bed and I tucked my knees inward, exposing my ass cheeks better and he hugged me from behind, spooning me with every forward motion.

"Faster, dammit!" I growled when he tried to kiss my neck and wasn't keeping pace anymore.

And that's when he got it. Thank God, he fucking figured it out because I was _so_ frustrated at that point.

I kept throwing instructions to him, about what was and wasn't working. He got angrier with every command.

"Got it, Mello. Now shut up and kneel."

I got on all fours and he shoved his dick in so hard that I didn't have the time to think about not making any noise. With one arm around my waist he grabbed the base of my penis and squeezed me so hard, pumping his hand up and down across my skin, not once hesitating to ram me from behind. I began to really feel it, to feel him moving around inside me. I was on fire. I was cussing at the mattress, saying every expletive in my lexicon as Matt fucked me, finally just _fucked me._ He was breathing so hard as he pushed and pulled and grabbed and something about being touched from the outside and the inside all at once had me reeling in pleasure. It was Matt. _Everything_ was Matt. Matt on me, Matt in me, my sensory nerves dancing and screaming and knowing_ just Matt_. He shuddered his seed into to me all too quickly and I nearly hit him for finishing too fast. I didn't want him to pull out. But his earlier display of understanding hadn't dissolved; he leaned over me and I found myself on my back once again, in full tessellation, and he made his mouth good on my nipples as he pumped me harder and harder, cupping my balls in between his slender fingers. I leaned up into him and was hungry, desperate even, to feel him inside me again, his fingers, his tongue, anything. I thew my arms around his neck and settled for his tongue in my mouth I couldn't keep my hands off his hair, his neck, his collar bone. I wanted all of it. Fuck I wanted all of it. Even long after I'd emptied my semen all across his hand, our mouths moved in desperate kisses and Matt fully collapsed himself over me, tangling our legs and our torsos and we just touched each other until a phone rang and Matt had to take the call.

I watched his back as he walked away from me. He didn't need to swish his hips use any gimmick to seduce me. It might not have been clear to me when I had set off on the plane a few days before, but perhaps the biggest reason I had chosen to steal from Matt first, was to get this chance. But I probably never even needed an excuse like that to get him to give himself to me.

Why had I ever doubted myself?

"Hey, Mel, you cold?" Matt pulled the comforter down and I hopped off the bed and slid under it with him.

Unsurprisingly, he pulled me close to him and rested his forehead against mine, like we had done when we were children.

"Mello?"

"Nn..."

"Do you...have to go back soon?"

I kissed his nose but he didn't let me get away with the teasing as he lifted his head a bit and met my lips with his for another slow kiss. It wasn't desperate any more. It wasn't arousal. His lips merely ghosted across mine and I shivered involuntarily, my heart pounding much harder than during the sex. I opened my eyes when he pulled away and he was smiling at me, the same mischievous and content smile he'd always had, his eyes sparkling and I knew that it wasn't a mistake.

He'd been waiting for me, probably always had.

"Well seeing as I need to arrange for a new plane ticket anyways, I suppose that I might be persuaded to stay for a few days..." I grinned.

And stay I had. I ended up staying the full week before Valkyrie contacted the redhead directly, confirming her suspicions that I was with him. She'd scolded him for_ ahem_ delaying my return to her, but Matt hadn't flinched at her threats. V was my problem, not his.

He had very little moral conscience to what the consequences of what he did. Hell if he had, we could have lived very very different lives.

* * *

"Near, why the fuck are you touching me?"

Near had leaned his head over me, the crook of my neck against his thigh. The pins and needles feeling was coursing through my body but I couldn't really move yet—not the way I wanted to at least. I'd never rest against him of my own volition. It happened that way after he'd ordered everyone away. He just scooted himself towards me and kind of cradled my head like that whilst looking down at me.

It was fucking creepy.

"It's what...Matt would have done."

"You aren't Matt."

"That's never stopped me before."

I was calmer than I should have been, and it disturbed me to no end that it was Near's physical gesture doing it to me. Near knew it. I knew he knew it. It was a total mind fuck and I hated it. Hated it, and yet all my tension was gone. Creepy-ass piece of shit motherfucking asshole.

"I'm guessing you have a death wish," I gritted between my teeth.

Near's hair was thinner than I remembered it, and just a bit darker as the grays had set in. He hadn't shaved that morning, from the centimeters of hair poking through on his chin and neck. I didn't want to look at his eyes. It was hard not to, the glint of those oversize glasses just caught all the light and demanded my attention if I so much as kept my eyes open. I didn't want to look at his eyes because I didn't want to hear whatever he had to say.

"Mello can kill me." He said after a moment of silence.

I blew air up, fogging up his glasses, "Stop dicking around, Near. Get to the point already."

"That was the point. And when you've killed me, please arrange the funeral nicely. Something small. Perhaps an open casket would be appropriate."

"Are you fucking high? Been taking an odd dose of meds or something?"

"Will you be there, Mello? Will you read A. E. Housman's _The Loveliest of Trees_?"

"Near?" I had a slight suspicion that he was coding his words.

He had taken a decidedly somber tone. "Open casket, bum up. You know where to put the calla lilies."

_Fucking hell! _My eyes widened in was no ambiguity in _that_. He was quoting Vogel at me. Near was having a fucking crisis to be stealing words out of _Baltimore Waltz._

"Stop shitting me, Near!"

He brushed a strand of hair out of the corner of my mouth and smiled very widely, "I have Acquired Toilet Disease."

I laughed. Near could still tell a _joke_, fucking hell, it was a head fuck. I wanted to cry except I couldn't stop laughing. If I stopped laughing the world was gonna break again. I just let the implications hit me and it left a sour taste in my mouth. It wasn't supposed to be like this at all. It was so screwed up.

"How long do you have?" I finally asked.

"I don't know. I'd prefer if you killed me before it's run its course, naturally."

"Cancer?" I ventured. Whatever was wrong with him it had to be terminal, and quotes or not I highly doubted it was AIDs.

He shook his head, "Lupus. "

I whistled. "Are you scared, Near? Is it scary to realize that you're human?"

I was mad and hurt all in one breath. How could he do this to me? How could he _do_ this to me? He was untouchable. He was fucking untouchable. Even if I wanted to gut his stomach out, I wouldn't dare do it now._ Damn him_! And then a whole flood of emotions hit me like water slapping and dragging me under. I wasn't going first. I wasn't gonna get my blazing execution. I was getting a second chance at life and Near was dying. Near was dying and it had nothing to do with me. Near was dying and I'd have nothing to chase after. Near was dying and the idea wasn't as pleasant as it should have been.

"I hate you," I rolled over just a bit, enough to get myself off of him. I couldn't stand being that close to him anymore. The tears I'd held in finally came, "I really just fucking hate you, Near."

"No, Mello." Near smiled weakly, "You don't."

_Bastard. _

* * *

A/N: I wanna pull my hair out right now because I had to cut it there. But this was the only way it made sense to me to cut it. So, how are you feeling about the story so far? Is it still interesting? Reviews are much appreciated.


	4. The True Meaning of Chocolate

The Headliner Chapter 4: The True Meaning of Chocolate

Chapter 3 Recap: Mello recalls how he was in the running once to replace Valkyrie, the world's greatest honey trap spy and the female counterpart to Watari. During his training, he met up with Matt for the first in years and led to a hot and heavy few nights in bed. It's also revealed that Matt was his own alphabet and had in fact been at Wammy's since birth, since he was part of the Legacy Letters who were trained to replace family members. In the present time arc, Near is dying, and there were some awkward hints that an ambiguous N/M relationship _might_ have existed once upon a yesteryear.

A/N: Thank you to everyone who reviewed. I really appreciate the feedback and it warms my heart to know that you're out there reading. This chapter was a bit of a head fuck for me as an author. It's some dark stuff, bruh.

In response to what keehlwithit so loquaciously pointed out, there's a few glaring holes with chapter 1. A good handful of those were intentional and get addressed in this chapter, so I hope you don't hate me for choosing to split up the information this way. I'm gonna go back (eventually) and fix some of the details but I'd just like to say that it has never been my intention to tell the back-story chronologically, and as for the things Mello chooses to reflect on? It's whatever he's associating with at the time.

* * *

Chocolate is a loaded substance for me. I could exist on that shit, not fucking exaggerating. It is the ambrosia of the Gods. It represents _so many_ things and comforts me on so many levels. Chocolate is my savior and my destruction in one silver-wrapped fallen angel. It calms my blood and lets me think clearly. Chocolate is the food version of sex...but I suppose the reason I'm so fixated with it has less to do with how I feel when I eat it and more to do with the fact that I associate it with the first time I met L. I used to want to _be_ the man, after all.

But _fucking hell_, I'm going out of order again. Before even getting to L, I have to backtrack to Matt. Always back to Matt.

Matt was and is always the center of fucking _everything_.

Summer hadn't ended when Matt was released from the hospital, and I was glad for it. I hated the trek to school; it was nearly two hours by bus, and Dale always grumbled about driving me the half hour to the bus stop in the morning. Such an ungodly thing, having to wake up with the sunrise whenever I needed to get to school. I think if the state wouldn't have jailed them, my parents wouldn't have sent me to school at all, for all the bother it caused. Summer was my refuge with Matt my world expanded. I would meet up with him frequently in the woods. He didn't like going to the house because my mom would fuss. Matt said he didn't trust adults...that they always got in the way of fun. I was just glad to be out of my stepfather's hair, and to have someone other than Rossy to keep me company. My stepfather, Dale, had a habit of driving friends away with his drunk-ass caterwauling. I tried my best to keep Matt away from him lest I lose him too. After all, meeting him was the most exciting thing that had ever happened to me.

There was a particular patch of woods near my house that we liked to play around in. Matt called it a treasure hunting game, but I should have been suspicious when our 'treasure hunting equipment' suddenly exceeded spades and metal detector. Matt had a whole array of tech shit that I was clueless about. I just figured it looked cool and it made the game more interesting. Chalk it up to childhood innocence and the desperate need of companionship that I blocked out the nagging questions from the back of mind. I just followed his lead, setting up ropes and pulleys and little machine things that I (much later) learned were infrared scanners. Near as I _wanted_ to understand, I was just playing a game with my new friend. They few times I did take Matt into my house, Mom was always her cordial Christian self, chatting him up nicely and playing a good hostess. But he was always vague when answering anything about his family. And he never needed a ride home, despite the fact that there were no houses within walking distance and he always stayed out as long as he wanted to.

"I moved here with my grandpa, and he lets me do as I please," he'd often say, but never gave a name or an address. His grandfather was a private man, he'd comment, before changing the subject and dragging us out the door once more.

And we fell into a rhythm like that. Just two kids playing in the woods. It was peaceful, and I was happy being with him, playing with him, falling asleep against him, surrounded by the calmness of the woods. It was a perfect summer.

Until Rossy went missing again.

And that was just the beginning of the horror story. For a week I searched for him with no luck. That Matt didn't accompany me in my quest for Rossy was something I'd asked of him. It was something I felt I needed to do alone, but I didn't have a clue how to track a dog. It wasn't like it had rained for there to be tracks or anything. It felt like I would wander, watching the the endless sea of deciduous trees. My childhood home wasn't _quite_ a city...it was a territory called Township Nine, or just T-9. Travelers often nicknamed our rural abyss the 'Endless Sky' for lack of anything and everything but sky and trees. It was great camping grounds but very secluded. Many miles to the south lay the potato farms. We weren't situated even remotely near a coastline, and the forest stretched as far as you could see for miles to the north. We almost didn't exist on a map. The likelihood that I'd find Rossy was the about the same as T-9 suddenly becoming an island resort.

I remember how hard it was not to cry.

My mother had suggested I stop being stupid and ask Matt to help me look, but when I tried to find him, he was no where. He had a cell phone but the signal was always sketchy in the woods. He hadn't told me the number anyways. I had just taken it for granted that Matt showed up after breakfast time every morning to play with me. Yet in all the days that I'd looked for Rossy, I hadn't once crossed paths with Matt in the woods. For all I knew, he'd up and moved away again without saying goodbye. Those were stupid irrational thoughts, but I clung to them anyway, just angry and frustrated for being so alone.

"Yeah, well, good riddance! I didn't need you anyway!" I had screamed the loudest I could and ran with reckless abandon. I don't know if I meant it towards Rossy or Matt.

Near the end of the second week I packed for a longer trip. I didn't tell anybody, just ran. Miles. Deeper and deeper into the woods. I had nothing but my compass and some sparse camping gear in a pack on my back. I had planned on being back by nightfall but the gear was just insurance for if night fell too deeply. I wanted to go to our old special spot, a special camp ground spot that I used to go on weekend trips with my dad...when he had been alive. I hadn't been there since my mom had married Dale. That had been when I was seven, and Dale had forbidden any trips there since. What I really wanted though was some comfort and that place held my last great memory of my dad. I didn't know what I was looking for exactly but the last thing I planned on finding when I made it to the clearing...was Matt.

He was crouched near a tree, inspecting some metal doohickey or whatever the contraption was, but he saw me long before I reached him.

"Matt!" I called out to him, but he tensed at my arrival. "What are you doing here? How did you—"

He raised his fingers to his lips when I approached him and he beckoned me away with wild eyes, "Mello you need to get out of here."

It was wrong and it was strange. Matt at the special spot. Matt at _my _special spot that I'd not told him about, much less shown him. He couldn't have known about it, yet he was there. Against all reason he was there _and_ and he was kicking me out. The hours of exhaustion from getting there in the first place, mixed with the surprise of finding him in that impossible location. I went off on him.

"What the fuck, Matt?" That was the first time I'd ever cussed. That's how bizarre the situation was. That's how stressed I'd felt. "This is my special camping spot. How do you know about this place? What are you even _doing_ here? What is going on?"

Matt looked about as bewildered as I felt. When he didn't elaborate well, I grew angry, balling my fists. I punched a tree.

"Gee wiz, Mello, just don't make a fuss. I need you to not question me and just do what I say. This place is fucking dangerous so please just leave right now."

At that moment, I realized that even though we'd only known each other a short time, I'd made Matt take the place of a best friend, or possibly something closer to a brother. Whatever he was spooked about, I was hurt that he didn't think he could tell me. And if he wanted to be alone all he had to do was _say so_.

"Like hell I'm going to just do what you say. I haven't even seen you in two weeks, man. And when I do, you sound like you're going crazy." I wasn't trying to be brat but I was already emotional. He didn't have to go and play with my head; I couldn't deal.

But Matt insisted that he hadn't been playing a game. He just kept looking over his shoulder and telling me that I needed to leave.

"Matt will you please tell me what's going on? You're scaring me."

He shook his head at me and gave me no answers. It hurt more than it should have, but I was emotionally wrecked over Rossy and taking everything more seriously than was sensible. Besides...he seemed so serious and determined about _something_. I retreated a bit away from the clearing and into the trees to collect my thoughts...but my foot caught on something and I tripped. After rolling myself into an upright position I scanned the floor, thinking I'd find some overgrown root that I'd missed in the underbrush. What I found instead...made my blood run cold.

"M-Matt! Matt! Get your butt over here!" I shrieked. I didn't trust my own eyes for a minute.

I heard the pitter-patter of his footsteps but I didn't take my eyes off of the object. I wasn't sure that I was really seeing what I thought I was. When the redhead let out a low whistle I knew he had seen the same as I and my heart dropped a bit more.

"Fucking hell, Mel, it's fresh," he had said after lifting it up and poking it lightly with his fingers, "No more than a week old I'd say."

He let out a spring of expletives before continuing, "How in hell did this one get past me? I've been watching this area closely! Where's the rest of it?"

I gaped at him, utterly scandalized, "Don't touch it! Oh my God! Matt what are you _doing_? We need to go the police. Stop messing around with it."

I don't remember if I cried or not. I'm pretty sure that I had a small panic attack though. I stumbled around the grass and the dirt and scraped my hands against some pebbles but a pair of hands quickly found my arms and I was held in place. As soon as I stopped moving, I threw up all over the floor. When I turned my gaze to the redhead, his eyes were cold and friendless.

"M-Matty?" My voice cracked. I was scared and there wasn't any hiding it. "Matt, why am I the only one freaking out over t-th-the sk-skull?"

It was moments before Matt released me and began to talk. "Mello. I'm really sorry. I'm really really sorry. I'm not at all who you think I am."

"Then tell me so I _can_ know! Please, what the hell is going on?"

The expression he gave me was very pain-filled, "Fuck it. You know this much, I might as well. Come. There's something you need to see."

We walked to a bit to to the east, maybe twenty minutes in that direction. All the while, Matt told bits of his story. It was like he was reading from a movie script and I didn't know how to take any of it in. The skull I'd found most certainly belonged to a child. He knew that because of the size and because he'd already found dozens of skelletons. He was on a mission to bring justice to the families of those lost and forgotten children whose bodies had found their way to the T-9 woods. He couldn't be sure the exact location of the murders but he was almost certain where the burial ground was.

"Mello, have you ever heard of L?"

"Of course I have. Who hasn't heard of _L_? He saved the world from the great bio-terror scare."

"Yeah, well _that L_. Thing is, I'm kind of his umn...apprentice."

My eyes widened, "Are you high or something?"

I was freaking out over _a fucking dead person_ and he wanted to sell me on some cockamamie story!

"Mello, I know this is a lot to take in, but I'm not kidding. I'm kind of like a spy? Or, no. A detective in training I guess, since that's what L is. Whatever. I don't even care what the hell it is they call me. I'm just doing this because I struck a deal and my shitty grandpa wouldn't let me—"

"Wait, back up, Matt. You already lost me. Tell it from the beginning."

"Okay. I suppose it starts off with _who_ I am, really…"

Matt's own story was far more fantastical than his explanation of the case he was investigating. He wasn't even the citizen of a country. He had grown up in seclusion on an island with an old man who he was pretty sure was his grandfather, getting trained in all kinds of information technology. Matt was a genius...a young genius, as was his mother and his grandpa before her. But when he'd turned ten years old he was entered into the system of a place called Wammy's House which trained geniuses to become various pillars of world order. I now know much of what there is to know about Wammy's House, having long since been a resident within its walls, but Matt's initial description of it was like something out of a sci-fi novel. It was almost like a prison but with the most freedom that you could possibly have within the walls of a prison. You were free to do or be what you wanted to, as long as it promoted the welfare of Wammy's. It seemed to me like Matt could do anything with what they taught him at Wammy's, but against his strengths he worked as a field agent to prove himself to the detective L.

"But why are you trying to be a detective for L?" I asked cautiously. I waited for him to admit it was all bullshit.

Matt had been laying wires all around the area all while he was talking, and now he was placing devices down, "I made a deal with L. I don't want to be a detective, but he liked the shrewd way I approach problem-solving, or something that. I wasn't exactly paying attention to that part. What's important to me, is a certain case that I need solved. I want my father's murderer convicted. Right now that person is above the law, and only L can bring them to justice." His tone turned dark. "That case means everything to me. I basically agreed to be L's bitch for life if he'd get me a conviction."

"And that's why you're tracking down a murderer? So L will owe you a favor?" I raised an eyebrow at his logic.

"Shhh" He threw his hands over my mouth. "I've already told you too much, and this is isn't the place or the time. But I promise if we get through this alive, I'll tell you everything. Since I have you here with me, I'm going to go down _there_ and gather evidence. Will you be my backup? Will you be my eyes?"

"Down there? What's _there, _and what do you expect to find_?_"

"Look." he stopped before a large rock that had three crosses etched into the surface and began moving leaves and dirt away from it. After a few kicks of his foot, I saw a metal ring attached to a wooden board. It was a fucking cellar opening! In the fucking middle of fucking no where!

"Matt," my breath caught. Suddenly everything he'd said to me seemed tangible and I grabbed his hand, "You're asking me to help you? Why?"

His cheeks colored but he locked gazes with me with his sparkling green eyes, "You saved my life. I owe you for that. And…" He fidgeted in place a bit, "This is the first time I've ever had a real friend before. This is the first time I've ever trusted anyone enough to watch my back."

"What...what do you expect to find down there?" I turned my gaze away, confusion overtaking my heart. I didn't know how to feel, so I tried not to feel anything.

He pulled on the ring of the door and creaked the door open. There was a ladder descending into darkness. No way of telling how far down the drop could be.

"I don't know, but I have a strong theory. This is probably either a mass grave or trophy room of sorts where he keeps mementos of the victims. Does it matter? The man who made this is extremely dangerous."

I saw that he was as scared as I was, so I tugged his hand in the opposite direction, "Let's just go to the police, Matt. This is too much for you. For us."

"The police won't do shit! Mello, if my hunches are correct, then they're fucking in on it! " He grabbed my shoulders and began to speak wildly, "Mello, listen very carefully. This isn't a game, this is serious. There's a murderer on the loose. I've been tracking this bastard for months. He will kill me without hesitation," Matt paused before continuing lowly, "And you were already on the list to be a victim. I wanted to save you if I could. I didn't want to watch another child go on my watch."

His eyes were crazy, their deep green reflecting all his emotions...honesty, fear, concern. I couldn't help but believe him. I also couldn't deny the glaring red flags.

"You got close to me to keep me safe?" I asked softly, knowing the answer without being told. "How long have you known? How long have you known how the murderer was?"

"Since before I met you."

"You used me to get information on him, didn't you? How long have you been playing me?"

"No, Mello. Our friendship is genuine. I never planned on meeting you in person. I was only going to watch you from a distance and make sure nothing happened to you.

"Why? Why save me? What about the boy who's skull I nearly crushed a while ago? Why me, out of the dozens of victims?"

His silence was telling. I asked a different question, "What aren't you saying, Matt?"

He hugged me. His arms were warm as they enveloped me and I could feel the pain in his embrace, "The victims are all prepubescent boys with blue eyes and blond hair. Mello...I'm sorry. I think you're his end game."

I didn't cry. A numbness washed over me like it never had before. How do you deal with your world crashing down around you? It had already happened once when my real dad died. But learning that my stepfather was a cold heartless monster was more than I could even comprehend. It was as if my brain detached from my body and it was somebody else's horror story. Everything had to be a lie. Dale, Matt, the fucking woods, it all had to be a screwed up lie.

But I knew it wasn't. Years of clues stacked up and threw themselves at me and in that moment I was less of a child than I had ever been. I closed my eyes and my memory supplied all the evidence I'd ever need: every little glance and look he'd given me over the years now took new meaning...the random times he'd been gone too long, the tools, the obsession with amber alert stories, the stains on his clothes, the bloodied tools he'd wash in the middle of the night. Hunting trips _my ass_, that lying sack of shit rarely bought meat home but always had enough bloodied equipment—I threw up again. If Matt hadn't held onto me, my knees would have given up on my body completely.

I couldn't help but believe him. It clicked too damn well into place.

Matt clasped his hand in mine and placed my palm against his chest, "Do you feel my heart?" His pulse was wild, "I'm scared right now, but I'm outwardly calm because I know you're here watching me."

I couldn't say a word. I was in shock. Against all the numbness, Matt gave me some warmth. I felt special and scared shitless all at once.

Matt took out a key chain flashlight and argued that he would investigate the hole alone, "Don't follow me!" he warned.

"How can I just let you go down there alone?"

"Mello, I need you keep an eye out. If for some reason Dale _does_ come around, you are the only one of us who can stall him for time."

Thus I got stuck with sentinel duty. I stood up there watching the rustic circle of the dead bolt and the rotting door until I heard a scream. I didn't even think before leaping the ladder steps into the darkness below. With everything that had happened, I wasn't even capable of thought anymore. My feet moved because I knew that I had to reach my friend and protect him like he'd been doing for me before I'd even met him.

"Matt!" I screamed, fumbling in the dark. I called out for him a few more times, my pulse pounding in my ears. I was scared. It was so dark and there were rustling noises and I could hear nothing but the sound of my voice echoing. My brain told me that there shouldn't haven't been an echo. But he never answered my call. I felt a sharp pain in the back of my head before my world faded into nothingness.

I cannot recall most of what happened from there. Whether I was unconscious or I have blocked out the memories as a self-defense mechanism, I do not know, but only three things stick out to me with clarity: the well, the dog, and the call.

When I woke up, it was dark. The first thing I registered was the deep darkness. The next thing I felt was the cold and a horrible ache near the back of my head. I gasped in pain, dizziness taking over my senses but a rank smell assaulted my nostrils. I tried to cover my mouth and touch my head at the same time only to find my arms shackled against the cold walk behind my back. I understood nothing except that I was still alive. I remember screaming for Matt and not knowing where I was or where he was. Day break brought about bits of light and from what I could tell I wasn't in the cellar hole. I was at the bottom of a well that must have been about 20 feet deep. The light was my worst enemy. It helped me figure my surroundings out, and _God_ did I need to be ignorant on that. I wasn't alone in that well. I was the only one alive, but I wasn't alone.

I'd finally found Rossy. I wish I hadn't.

I can never shake the image from my mind, the image of that dog, my long-time friend...as his half eaten corpse lay at the foot of another corpse. The teeth of that forgotten child were closed around his leg even in death. The smell that I couldn't stand was their decaying bodies. The heat down in that hell of a well had caused the bodies to decompose faster than the normal rate and my company down in there was the smell and the maggots and the flies as they assaulted my senses. I remember nothing else but the bodies and screaming as my mind couldn't keep up with the madness. I splintered all my fingernails into bloody stumps clawing at the walls aimlessly.

And then somewhere in that madness Matt came to my rescue. I don't remember being cut loose from the chains or anything, just struggling to hold onto his back as he we scaled the wall of the well. Later I'd learn that I'd been down there for two days during which Matt fought for his life and mine.

The details are so blurry. They come in fragments. Matt. Matt's hand. His voice calling my name. His arms around me. His tears. My tears. The exhaustion. The smell of smoke and the burnt trees. The skeletons. The endless corpses. Dead Dale and the burning trees.

I remember the call with some clarity though. Out of no where the laptop came out. I remember seeing a gothic w on the screen and Matt speaking into a headset that he'd attached to it.

His voice had been hysterical with sobs, snot coming out of his nose, "Hello? Watari? Patch me through to L. I've fucked everything up. Yeah, I understand! I don't give a shit!" Matt screamed into the phone, "Take me out the fucking ranking! To hell with that shit. Just send me help _now. _I've screwed up so badly this time."

I only registered Matt's fingers linked through mine as my vision went out from blood loss.

The next time I woke up I was lying in what felt like a hospital bed, but I was distinctly not in a hospital. There was something attached to my arm. I was groggy but I still panicked well enough to take in my surroundings at a half glance: a drip connected to my arm, curtains around chairs and what appeared to be a cockpit of _a fucking plane_. Not the least disconcerting was the woman half asleep in the chair directly near my bed. Her head was a mop of unruly red hair. When she blinked at me, I knew I recognized the intense emerald hue of her eyes. As if reading my mind she introduced herself to me as Matt's mother. Honestly, after everything I'd seen and heard, nothing surprised me anymore. Her name was Dicey and she'd been silently following Matt's progress on his case because she was worried about him. When Matt sent his distress signal up, she'd gotten to us before L had and had assisted in wrapping matters up. She knew who I was because Matt had spent so much time with me in the months past. Dicey hadn't interfered because it was against Wammy protocol for her to help the apprentice of another letter when on a mission from their mentor. She'd gone crazy with Matt's injury and thanked me repeatedly for taking care of him and taking him to the hospital. She said she knew I was a good kid, with what I'd done for Matt when he'd caught on fire during the storm. As if prompted by our voices, a man stepped out from the curtain. He had dark circles beneath his eyes and his hair was a hapless mess of raven spikes. He beckoned for Dicey to go to him. She made to leave but as she stood Matt appeared from behind the curtain, looking livid. At the sight of him, the woman turned her attention back to me with a wide smirk across her features.

"Mello was it? Thank you for making friends with Matt. He's always been such a social child but he usually only makes false friends. I've never known him to go out of his way to help someone else like this." She paused and sized me up, whispering, "Did he try to show you his _little Matt_? He's got a bit of a thing for blonds, just like his good for nothing father, "she added darkly. "_used _to. When he was alive..."

"Dicey, will you shut up and leave him alone?" Matt curled his fist into a ball, not meeting his mother's eyes, "Mello's been through an ordeal and doesn't need to deal with your crass bitchiness."

"Ohhh, what's this, this whole time your little damsel in distress was a _boy?_" She looked from Matt to me and back to Matt again, before rushing the redhead in a scooping hug, "Awww, my little _bi-baby_. I had no idea you swung that way too."

Matt bristled at the woman's touch, and seemed ready to claw her skin out.

"Well Mello," she put a thumb to her lip, grinning in a way that made me scoot in the opposite direction on the makeshift bed, "It's been nice meeting you but I'm afraid you know a little too much now. You'll have to be dealt with."

At her words, Matt lost it.

"Fuck you, bitch. Don't you _dare _touch him." Matt was like a feral cat, blocking the woman from me, "I'll kill you."

"Aww Matty how can you be so mean to your mother?"

"Do you have any concept of what a fucked up piece of shit you are? You just threatened to kill my friend! And i know you'd do it, like you've tried with me before. I know you'd do it because you fucking killed my dad! You're no mother of mine. Mothers don't try to poison their kids." he spat in a barely audible voice, hatred dripping from every word.

"Oh c'mon," she rolled her eyes, "That was _one _time. Two tops."

The dark-haired man interrupted her, "Actually it was twenty-three times. That's why we took him away from you. Matt please drop the knife. Mello is is no immediate danger, but I believe you are close to breaking his hand."

Matt released my hand, having not even noticed how forcefully he'd been holding onto it.

"Why don't we have proper introductions. I am L. This is Dicey Jeevas, Matt's mother, "

"Birth-sack! She is not a mother!"

"Mello, I believe Matt has told you a little bit about a place he works for, right?"

"Wammy's House, sort of, yeah." I breathed out. My head was killing me and I didn't understand the strange dynamic between Matt and his mother, nor why L allowed the charade to go on.

L went into his own description of Wammy's House, which different greatly from the condensed version Matt had given me in the woods.

"So you train people to be like you? To be detectives?"

"Well some of them. I train only my own successors. People get trained to be many things. For example, Dicey is an assassin."

"And Matt is your successor? Is that why he was here the whole time? To solve a case for you?"

"Well yes and no. See, Matt was my successor until a few hours ago. The second he made the emergency phone call he forfeited his apprenticeship to me. Mello, you might also be interested to know that Matt was first in line to be the next L. He was the top candidate."

I turned to Matt, who shrugged, "I told you that I never felt like being a stupid detective anyway. I just wanted revenge on that bitch over there, and besides I got tired of following my shitty grandpa around all day doing odd jo—"

Matt hadn't had a chance of finishing the sentence before the woman backhanded him across his jaw, sending him reeling in the opposite direction. "Don't speak of my father like that."

"Fuck you. I will fucking call the old man whatever the fucking hell I want! You had no respect for _my_ father when you fucking poisoned him, so I will treat yours however the hell I want!"

"Why you little shithead!" she screamed before she lunged at her son.

It was like the world went into slow motion as L struck. His limbs moved in an almost unnatural yet fluid way as from one angle his fingers twisted Matt down and held his pressure points. The other end of his body was equally poised. His leg went straight for Dicey's jugular and his bare foot pushed her backwards.

"Do not make me hurt the both of you. Save your feud or I shall be forced to intervene in a manner unfavorable to all parties involved." And like that both redheads were frozen with fear, their anger drained by L's threat. His voice was barely above a whisper and yet it felt like a command from death itself.

It was so bone-chillingly kick ass, I nearly pissed myself on the spot.

"Yeah, yeah, peace. Whatever. I love my son, L. Don't shit talk me."

"Yes," the man continued, "I'm well aware of how you love your son, rather to death."

"Heh." She moved backwards but Matt was still frozen, utterly defeated.

If I hadn't been watching his mouth, I would have missed his whisper, "fucking hate adults, the backstabbing assholes."

"What happened to Dale?" The previous days flashed before me and I felt horribly sick. Rossy, the dead boys, getting trapped in the well...learning what a sick fuck Dale truly was under all that. It had all been too much. Too surreal. My mind grasped nothing.

It was L who answered, "Dale met with the unfortunate end of some of Matt's pyromania."

Dicey cut in before L could continue, "He never did have a penchant for good bomb-making, the silly child. Probably used a little too much C4."

"You have been reported among the body count, Mello. You do not exist anymore in the world of the living. You will have to be taken care of." L threw a hand up to Matt who looked like he was about to protest all over again, "We have certain protocols of security to uphold. We're not in a position to just let you run around with the knowledge that Matt has given you, and—"

"Please, L! Please! Don't hur—"

"Matrix Jeevas, you will shut your bitch trap while an Alphabet speaks," growled Matt's mom and L continued.

"You didn't—

"Matt. You broke our deal. I will not be taking your case." He spoke with finality.

Matt shook, as he responded, "Fine. I'll just become my own letter then." He faced Dicey and spat at her with cold precision in his tone, "I'll be a letter and I'll take you down my own way. Slit your throat in my sleep if I have to."

Dicey merely smiled at her son. For the sparkle in her eyes, Matt could have professed his love for her, not threatened to kill her.

Nothing made sense.

"So, Mello. How do you feel about it? With my authority as an Alphabet I can recommend you to Wammy's House for tutelage. Consider it my way of thanking you for saving the life of my apprentice, even if he is currently no successor of mine."

"I don't really have much of a choice, do I?" I laughed. I laughed because that was the only way not to cry. I vaguely registered that one of the most powerful men in the world had just offered me a ticket to potentially become another such powerful man in the world. Then Matt's fears hit me in the gut and I felt quite sick. In a way I had hit the proverbial jackpot. But I was being offered sanctuary at the cost of my life. They'd fucking kidnapped me, and the alternative was death. And yet in the same breath, I would have died out there if they hadn't come to our rescue in the woods. L had decided to keep me alive when he could have let me die. He had decided to give me a future when he could have let me die.

I've rewritten the memory a hundred times over, and each time, I only feel it more succinctly that L was saving me. He wasn't a kidnapper. He had saved my life. He gave me a fucking life to live. He was truly frightening, and while it was completely out of my control, I knew in the instance that I gazed into his unblinking eyes that had I had a choice to run back to my mother and deal with the aftermath of Dale's evils...I would have chose Wammy's House 100 times over.

"Eat this to calm your nerves. I know this is a lot to take in." L handed me a wide bar of dark chocolate and I took it, not trusting myself to speak. "We will arrive in Winchester in a few hours. Try to rest and once we're there, you'll have the best medical team in the world attending to your injuries."

I looked over the chocolate from L but didn't unwrap it until he and Dicey moved to through a door to another area of the plane. Only Matt stayed with me.

We just kind of looked at each other silently during the rest of the plane trip, he saying nothing and I understanding everything and nothing. Matt moved a chair to my side and linked his fingers around mine before he openly wept, and then apologized over and over again. It was too much to take in. But I felt safe with his hand in mine.

After a while, Matt moved onto the mattress with me and fell asleep with his head in my lap. I couldn't sleep so I tried eating the bar that L had given me. I let it melt on my tongue and convinced myself that I hadn't sold my soul for that first bite of chocolate.

* * *

I had a bar of that very chocolate and was abusing the fuck out of it with my tongue, my amusement rising as the endorphins hit me full force. Near was in the corner, his hand clutched at his nose as it bled and ruined the fresh image of his skin, hair, and pajamas. I had chocolate and Near probably had a broken nose.

Everything was right with the world.

It had been Valkyrie who had done it to him. She'd walked in, sashaying that ancient ass of hers like she wasn't a day over 39. But then she'd taken one look at me and nearly cried.

"God, Mello, you look like total shit! Near, how could you do this to my chickadee, dressing him like this? Mello looks like he was dragged through the Walmart clearance rack and spit out of a Salvation Army reject pile!"

Afterwards, she'd let out a string of expletives as she hit him. Slugged him right across the face with her Birkin, telling him where she'd love to shove her stiletto heel. And then she'd given me chocolate.

God I loved V. The woman had _class_.

But that had been minutes ago, and now she was assessing me and insulting all the little flaws age had brought about in my physique and I knew the chocolate was to pacify me from doing to her what she'd done to Near.

I have a _bit_ of a temper and I'm just a _touch_ vain.

You would be too, if you had my legs.

"You need a haircut for one. You look _dreadful_ in a beard. And darling let's get you out of those bargain bin rags." She began stripping me like she'd done a dozen times in my youth, clicking her tongue in disapproval at my overgrown body hair. "Such a detestable man you are, Near. Never heeding my advice. I sent you lovely clothes on Christmas, didn't I?"

"Dey werebn't cubtorble," He nasalized, barely intelligible.

Did I mention he was sporting a broken nose? Valkyrie always had a sixth sense for which accessories went with what. Blood must be very in this season.

"Fashion is not about comfort, Near. It's as much a mind game as anything else you work with. None of predecessors were as finicky as you. You'll never measure up to half the men they were. I'm not asking you to wear an Armani suit, but even Lawliet wore Calvin Klein for me."

I was unabashedly enjoying Near out of his element. It was always interesting to see him get his panties in a twist but there was no one who irked him quite like the black woman in the room, that fabulous ex-mentor of mine, Valkyrie. Even through the wrinkles and the sagging flesh, you could see she'd been gorgeous in her hay day, with her dark skin and sharp features. She'd shaved her head and wrapped an ethnic scarf in endless ribbons that ended on the curves of her neck. You'd never know she was pushing ninety the way she strutted those stilettos. It was amazing that she could still handle high heels at her age.

"Val," I smiled at her.

She embraced me with more force than necessary, "It's _Madame Valkyrie_. Don't you dare address me so casually when you're dressed like shit. And this hair," She nearly shrieked at my hip-length tresses, "It needs life! It's needs color and bounce. You have split ends, Mello."

"Age has treated you well," I stuck my tongue at her in the bratty way I had done when I was a teenager, "but I hardly recognized you without your enormous tits."

Unabashedly, she pulled her blouse up to reveal large scars that covered her chest, "I considered implants after the mastectomy, but I just didn't want to bother in case the cancer decides it wants a second go at me."

After a quick health update, she wasted no time in getting my naked self atop a table. She split her attention between Near and I as she worked, waxing every inch of me until my body was smooth as a baby's butt.

"Is this much necessary?" Near chimed in after a while.

"As if you've ever complained about seeing me naked!" I flipped him off without a glance in his direction. "Are you gonna pretend like you don't have a hard-on, Near? Wait, don't answer that. I don't need a mental image of your old wrinkly dick."

Rather than let him respond, Valkyrie cut in, "I was so disappointed when you left me to be L's apprentice, Mello. Why did you hand your crown to this dip shit?" She stopped to point at Sheep-bitch on the floor, "Do you have any idea what it's like working for Near? Lawliet, now _there_ was a man who appreciated what was done around him. I have tried and tried with this one, but he so stubbornly refuses to heed my suggestions."

"I am not nearly as concerned with my _looks_ as the two of you," Near rolled his eyes, but he didn't take his eyes off of me. The perv.

"I can't take you serious in that cotton shit, Near." Val was always adamant about clothes. Her obsession was her genius quirk, "At least let me set you in silk."

"No thank you."

"This is the last job I do for you, Near. If it wasn't for Mello, I'd have ignored your call." I winced as she ripped all the hair from my pubes, "After this, _fuck you_."

To his credit, the little ass hat didn't blink at her when he responded, "I prefer working with your predecessor, anyway."

_That_ was an interesting snippet of convo to me, "You mean you haven't passed your letter _yet_? What happened to Wedy?" I huffed as she continued with my 'manscaping'.

"If I could still hand it tor you, I'd step down this instant, Mello, you_ know_ that." She hung her head, genuine sorrow passing through her features, "Wedy made a mistake. It's a sad thing to bury your successor and retake your own letter."

Oh. _Ohh fuck..._ I cringed a bit, feeling more regret than I had in years. I had genuinely liked Wedy as I was growing up. She was great competition once upon a time, but an even greater friend afterwards.

"Well, what about now?" I squeezed Val's arm, "You have another successor?"

"She's doing her first solo mission with you. You've already met the new chickadee."

Wait. _Wait._ I blinked with realization. The _fuck_?

I sat still as she trimmed the dead edges of my hair off, "Don't take off too much length, I warned her. I wanted to see how much I resembled Gandalf with my overgrown tresses. "And do you mean_ Lidner_? The prudish kid with the sucky acting is gonna be the next _Valkyrie_? Are you fucking shitting me?"

Oh what a _sad_ sad state Wammy's was in if that was how shit was going down.

But Val laughed, "If that's your first impression then I'd say she certainly did her homework before going to meet you. What could possibly be more dangerous than an opponent you underestimate?"

I frowned, "You're insulting my intelligence."

"You think I can't pick 'em, boyo? Maybe I made a mistake with _you_, then."

I flipped her off and slipped off the table, not caring for the turn of the conversation, "Alright bitch, enough with the chitchat. Where's my 'armor'?"

She produced a bag from under the table and handed it to me, "Only the finest for a battle of wits. You have to blow their minds, chicky."

Piece by piece I donned the beautifully soft leather. Valkyrie had selected a set of chick black leather pants, unadorned but masterfully stitched. It was a classic timeless cut and they slid across my newly waxed legs and I relished the softness. The cut was high waist and I tucked a red button-down into them. Valkyrie immediately pulled the hem out again and batted my hands away.

"Don't you dare tuck in that shirt, Mello. Let it loose, be your casual self with danger laced beneath the smile. Too much business in your stance, and you'll look like you've stepped out of the godforsaken mafia! Oh and I have _just_ the tie for that, don't move."

My sleeves were airy and puffed a bit when I slipped the vest over the shirt. The one-shoulder vest was not a cut I was familiar with and Valkyrie had to pull and adjust it at different angles around my back and chest. It only covered my front in solids while the rest was a lattice of straps and buckles. Over the vest fitted a custom piece done in _rust_ _red_ leather. It had all the trim and fit of a suit jacket but with with zippers adorning every three or four inches of space. It was a beautiful patchwork of zips but the front was three breasted buttons like a proper suit. I felt compelled to leave it unbuttoned but Val insisted I wear it closed. I felt the height addition as I stepped into the shoes she'd selected for me. Pointed toes were always in, but she'd chosen a pair without laces or buckles. The main attraction was the jacket then, going by the simple theme of the other pieces. White gloves to peak out the tips, but nothing to outshine the red.

There is a bit of a science behind that. The color red travels fastest of all the colored lights and therefore your eyes are always attracted to it first. It is how painters have guided our eyes for years, drawing us first to central points by the use of color. I image Val had a similar thought when she'd put together my outfit.

With a final nod from Val I took a step towards the long panel mirror that she'd set up in the far corner of the room. Nearly forty years without a proper mirror, and I was about to see myself for as an old man for the first time.

* * *

A/N: SO! How are you liking the story so far? Next chapter, Mello's retrial!

I'd love to know your thoughts on the story. I swear I don't know how these monstrous chapters keep happening. They characters just don't let me stop typing XD

Please leave a review :3


End file.
